Street Light Retrofits: GIS adds Value, Capability and Profits!

In 2009 the US Department of Energy began providing block grants to Cities, communities, States, and Indian Tribes, (among others) to increase the energy efficiency of their facilities and infrastructure.  One major component of this program was the upgrade of street lighting systems to more energy efficient fixtures.  Obviously, the replacement of so many light pole fixtures (for an entire city, county or state highway system) represents a large amount of data to be managed. Geographic Information systems (GIS), supported by GPS/GNSS data collection, provides a valuable set of tools for companies involved in street lighting retrofit work.

Most of the street light networks in the US are managed by cities, municipalities, counties, and state governments, along with regional utilities commissions, etc.  More and more of these government entities are requiring that contractors report their utilities data in GIS compatible formats.  As GIS is more widely used, utilities managers demand highly precise geographic locations and organized, integrated attribute management systems from their contractors, in order to manage the information efficiently. 

One company that is a leader in the use of GPS and GIS to support their streetlight work is Northwest Edison (NWE).  NWE is a moderate sized electrical engineering and construction company located in Woodinville, Washington, just outside of Seattle. When required by a client city to provide highly accurate light pole locations based on GPS derived coordinates, NWE invested in a state of the art Trimble Geo series, sub-foot accurate GPS receiver.

Along with Terra Sync ® software, this unit enabled NWE staff to gather accurate pole locations during field audits, along with all the attributes they needed to use for equipment ordering, status and condition tracking, and export all of it to standard GIS formats. Collecting such accurate positions and all the relevant attributes during pre-installation audits put Northwest Edison in the advantageous position of being a step ahead of competitors when bidding on the actual retrofit contracts, which are often separate from the initial audit phase of these projects. Also, NWE now has the side benefit of being able to conduct independent audits of street light networks as a sideline business offering, regardless of the status of the actual equipment replacement project schedule. They can provide high quality, accurate audits to cities to help them in their grant applications.

Of course, gathering data is great; but the question arises “What do we DO with it all?”  When faced with this question, Northwest Edison called me Tom Simon at Synthos, LLC.  They had a great data collection tool, but needed to find a way to manage the data, create maps, and provide the data to their clients in a simple, efficient, and cost effective way.  We helped them select software, developed customized training, and provided support which enabled NWE to make use of the power of GIS without a large financial and time investment.  They did not need a “GIS department,” but just some tools and training so they could use the tools and data to provide industry standard products, and some pretty cool and useful Map Books for their field crews to use.  With the support of Synthos, Northwest Edison has become a leader in their industry in the use of GPS and GIS, increased their efficiency, provided higher quality data products to their customers, and expanded their business opportunities.  Take a look at their great GIS page!

Interested in doing the same with your business? 
Call me, Tom Simon at:  206-406-5246,
or E-mail me at: tom@tomjsimon.com